Tuesday, July 01, 2008

At a recent family/friend get-together, there was this dish.....a dish that I can only describe as incandescently delicious. If any of you are fans of fruit-type salads, y'know...a little jello, a little cool whip, etc, etc, then you MUST, MUST, ABSOLUTELY MUST! try this salad! It is so delicious to the taste!!!!

Let me go a little deeper and explain how I feel about fruit salad. About side dishes in general, really...I truly think that all that meat & main-dishy stuff is superfluous. It's all about the sides for me baby!!

big trays of fruit & cheese, a well made green salad; Erin, you rock!(Nothin' like a tasty salad in a beautiful bowl! This one was even yummier than it looked--which is saying something!)

and of course, the fruit salad.

The sheer variety of what you can comPILE onto your plate is mind-numbing!

See what I mean....This plate is pretty good...missing some noodles maybe....although I would still give it an "8" out of "10" because of the layering technique used.

Here's another....Now this plate is near perfect! Notice the noodles nestled next to the macaroni salad. Very appropriate.....ditch the chicken for a nice, fat peanut butter finger, and you're there!

Anyway, back to the fruit salad! I have special feelings about fruit salads. I never met one I didn't like. And this one I LOVED!!!! Three times now I have made myself utterly sick eating this salad! (and I mean utterly sick in the best way possible.....)

I will be making it AGAIN this Fourth of July. I will double the batch because I could eat a whole batch myself. No lie. I suggest you do the same.

This recipe requires several hours to set up. It's best to make it the night before you want to serve it.

Empty the three boxes of Jello & pudding into a medium saucepan. Add three cups of water to the powder mixture. Stir and cook on medium high until the mixture begins to boil. Let boil about 1 minute. Remove from heat and place into large bowl to refrigerate. Let sit in fridge overnight. When you are ready to serve, take jello mixture and stir it to loosen it up. Stir it pretty good, but not TOO good. Then, fold in the 8 oz. Cool Whip and the fruit. How much fruit is a personal decision. I use 1 1/2-2 pints of raspberries to a double batch and it's perfect.

Seriously, people.....if you have any love at ALL for the fruitus saladus genus of food, you MUST make this ASAP. And then pass this recipe along. And don't forget who gave you the recipe that changed your life.

That is a great salad... we have it every forth of July, baby blessing, baptism, family BBQ, "Friend" gatherings, do you get my point? Very tastey!! Depending on the mood, Raspberry and orange are the best!

Your variation for the 4th of July was yumilicious. Any recipe I get from Tammy is worth making. More than half the recipes in my "personal" handwritten cookbook are from Tammy. Nirvana will soon bless the pages too.

First of all... I ate this food! I was there! I consider myself quite lucky! It was really yummy! And when people come to eat at the merryweather's (including other merryweathers,) they NEVER go home disappointed! Ok, so now for that salad... it was raspberry heaven-creamy, fruity, make you mad because it was gone when you went back for seconds--delectable!thanks for posting the recipe!